The Horror of Our Love
by Bayonet
Summary: One-sided affections are not uncommon in his life. That does not mean that they don't ache as much as any sword blow. AltMal kink meme fill.


There had been a time where the mere touch of Altaïr's hand would have made him recoil as if he had been bitten. The man could be as unthinking and violent as a cobra. But he had his moments. There was a tender side to him that no-one else saw. Save for one. He felt lucky sometimes.

There was typically little rhyme or reason to Altaïr's visits. He was a busy man, constantly flitting from one side of the country to the next on the whims of his master. And yet he always seemed to possess enough time to visit Malik, regardless of what his mission entailed. Be it another mark or simply an informant's information he sought after, the assassin found that the one place of safety throughout his journey was always the bureau of his one-armed friend.

They had grown close over the months, and it felt strange and foreign to be able to once again talk to the assassin without anger and hatred bubbling forth from his heart at the very sight of him. The first time they had interacted in a sexual way had been the result of an argument that had gotten out of control. One word led to a blow, and that blow led to many more. Finally, lips interlocked angrily, teeth clicking with the sheer force of the kiss. And then they had been on the floor in a thrashing heap of limbs and fabric, Altaïr ripping his robes from his body with such vigor that they had to be mended later. There had been bruises that night, as well as angry words and shame.

Altair had fled the next morning, and Malik did not see him for a month. The fact that he returned at all meant that he either had a death wish, or what had happened between them had intrigued more than embarrassed him.

The next experiment had been much more pleasurable for both parties. The rafiq had received him more readily, and there hadn't been so much fury in the few words exchanged between them. Malik only hesitated once, when it had become apparent that this was not a passing whim with him and Altair. The man had returned to fulfill a very specific goal, and that there was no retrieving their actions once they had been flung like so many coins into a stream. He had folded himself into his former friend's embrace that night, and had wept for everything that they could never be.

It had become a ritual after that, one that neither Malik nor Altaïr admitted to. A pattern spread across so many months, irregular as it was secretive. There wasn't any explanation for the feelings that passed between them. They were as intangible as they were fleeting. It terrified Malik when he could not place what made his heart ache and his breath hitch in his throat whenever the assassin touched him. He was a man of words, of scrolls and tomes and knowledge that he could run through his fingers and possess. As much as he twisted and moaned under his grasp, and Malik struggled to hold down what rightfully belonged to him, keep him in that bed and hide the shame and guilt, he could not possess Altaïr.

The revelation had made him angry. Why could he not have him? Why had those nights been buried and forgotten when the sun rose? It had been Altaïr who had started to leave earlier and earlier, often right after the act had been finished. Those warm hands would slip from their position on Malik's flesh, and _damn him,_ he would collect his abandoned robes and slip silently into the darkness of the bureau. A flash of white, and the man would disappear, back to whatever endless task he had been assigned. The wall would return between them, and life would resume as if it had never stopped.

He felt weak when he moved into Altaïr's touch, when he moaned his name and arched against his chest, felt his wet kisses trail down his throat and hum against his own racing heartbeat. And it was always that nagging thought at the back of his mind, the one that hovered like some bad omen over his thoughts when they finally cleared. _You can never have him. _Too much history had sieved through their shared lives to ever be clean again. Guilt and shame and that cursed longing that made him wait for the man to drop through his Bureau, made him spit curses in his direction when he faltered or failed, made him bite at those lips with the ferocity of a caged dog.

Reservation meant nothing. Love was absent. There could only be the nights they shared, and nothing else.

And it had been a terrible jolt to realize that this was how their love was to be. Forever waiting, wanting, disgusted by his own trembling when lips embraced dusky flesh and cries echoed in the cold night. Malik wanted to fight the reality, wanted to change his own desires, redirect them to another outlet and forget Altaïr ever existed. Why had he not married, found a beautiful woman to lavish with gifts and attention and love? Assassins did not understand love. They took life into their hands, and they crushed it into a thousand fragments like it was some useless bauble.

And when he held Altaïr in his own hand, and elicited those strangled sounds that made his own heart leap into his throat, it was his own touch that was meant to destroy, dismantle every awkward advance at friendship they had ever attempted to build. Fingers that were foreign to feathery touches or soft caressing. They only knew bloodshed and pain and it was this that made him hold his hand over that perfect body, longing to trace the muscles beneath caramel skin. It was this same understanding that caused him to be unable to bring himself to use his body for anything other than a vessel for the other assassin's lust.

He didn't deserve any better.

Conventional wisdom told him to simply let go, to let himself be claimed night after night, to forget that endless ache that came with being used so thoroughly and then forgotten only to be rediscovered once again. It wasn't as if there was anything he could do to stop the winding trend that had developed between the two assassins. His lover, if he could even be called that, did not speak of the acts that they performed during the nights when he was in Jerusalem. And because he was silent, it meant that Malik, if he valued the physical contact that he was indulging in, should hold his tongue as well. Altaïr was not a man of words, and as Malik sought information and understanding, he required only action and means to an end. There would never be whispered affections, or love poems, or confessions of longing. They would not, could not delve into that realm. Altaïr's pride prevented it, and Malik's heart refused to believe that it was possible.

Because if he tried to place into the physical world what his body screamed silently every time the man touched him, the delicate balance would be thrown and he would be alone again. And what scared him beyond the dark and tortured choices he had come to accept was the thought of having no-one to return to.


End file.
